BPT Mobile, a new solution for the quality control of industrial baths that contain cleaning or wetting agents

The new Bubble Pressure Tensiometer - BPT Mobile is an instrument for determining the surfactant content by investigating the dynamic surface tension (SFT) of a solution. This mobile solution works independently from a computer and providing results within a few seconds, which is a particularly essential feature for quality control applications.

Whether an industrial bath obtains the required cleaning or wetting effect is dependent on the concentration of free surfactants, which decreases over time due to the contamination of the bath or adsorption on the workpiece. The dynamic SFT reacts very sensitively to changes of the surfactant concentration which then allows the BPT Mobile to make bubble pressure measurements that accurately reflect the bath’s quality.

The BPT Mobile is equipped with a color touch display for simple operation that ensures every desired function is accurately triggered, even responding when laboratory gloves are in use. This hand-held instrument saves time mainly due to the immediate analysis of the results. With just a glance, the operator is able to see if the measured value lies within a defined quality range. Automatic graphing features will outline the surfactant contents’ tendencies over a set amount of time for easy interpretation. Predictions can be made as to when additional dispensing will be required or if the bath will need to be refreshed instead of having to react quickly when a critical surface tension (SFT) value was reached. And the instrument offers the “continuous” mode, which makes it possible to monitor the changes in surface tension while dispensing a surfactant.

Due to the sensitivity of the bubble pressure method, the SFT will correlate with the concentration of any given solution, including the surface age which is dependent on the type of surfactant being used. The BPT Mobile supports one of the most important preparation steps, which is defining the analysis parameters for the subsequent rapid quality routine. When being used in the field of quality control or quality assurances, the instrument has a mode for measuring the dynamic SFT as a function of the surface age over a wide range between 10 and 30.000 ms. These parameters can also be used for easy-to-create templates within the software, in order to consistently measure under the same conditions – and these templates also allow for multiple parameters different baths that are being tested independently from one another.

The BPT Mobile instrument uses inexpensive, disposable capillaries for air bubble creation during bubble pressure measurements. This feature is particularly advantageous for easily-contaminated samples. Thanks to the KRU?SS instrument’s intelligent control and precise measurement of the pressure, it can work independently from the immersion depth to the greatest possible extent and therefore also accurately perform when being held in one’s hand. User error is virtually ruled-out during testing, and the temperature for each data point can be documented thanks to a removable temperature sensor.